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Online now: 1 member: TABLE SETTER 11; 85 anonymousDiscussion: 3rd party review of the Rip It Reaper
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| June 5, 2007 azsenior 92 posts | 3rd party review of the Rip It Reaper Taked from another site: Matthew Polstein, President of Rip-It-Elite, was kind enough to send me out a Demo bat of his new Rip-It-Elite Reaper 120. As some may know, this is the second reincarnation of the Reaper (different from the demo model out some time back) that has a .75oz endload in it. The graphics, I must say are a step above the Senior and ASA versions, not that it matters, but Rip-It can now say with confidence that they are no longer the ugliest kid (bat) on the block! As always we test our bats with various balls using a combination of 44/375, 47/525, and a half dozen Ultimate Evils and SB12's, all thrown from a Juggs pitching machine to achieve as much consistency as possible. The field we use is our local High School baseball field with fences marked at 320-400-320. Comparison bats included Freak +, OGJH Mayhem and Brett Helmer Syn +. With that out of the way, the bat I received was a 27oz, it weighed in on the postal scale at 27.2oz, damn good if you ask me! First impressions of this bat is that it has a very nice endload to it, not overpowering like the XEL Anti-Virus/Virus, but a tad more than the OGJH. If I had to compare the endload of this bat to sticks most of you all have, it would have to be the Freak+, this was agreed upon by all who were there. Stick true to your weight if you purchase this bat as this bat does not feel too heavy like the XEL Combats or too light. The barrel is roughly 13" long, and tapers down to a industry standard thin handle. When I received this stick Matt mentioned it had roughly 100 hits on it, yet judging from the condition it was in....it could have been sold as NOW. Absolutely 0 wear and tear on the bat. +1 for durability I suppose. From the first 40-50 pitches or so, the bat was stiff, less than the Nexus, more so than a Mayhem. After no more than 50 hits this bat opened up in a very nice way and the sweetspot just spanned the entire barrel. The distance was impressive once broken in, easily competing with all the top Utrip bats out there. One very positive note is that when the stick did break in, the handle and barrel stayed relatively stiff. This bat does not have a soft/mushy feeling at all. To me, it feels very very close to a well broken in Freak +. A side note, the Reaper seemed to have the biggest sweetspot of any of the bats there in my opinion, beating out the Freak+, OGJH and BH Syn+...before you call BS let me explain. Where it seems bigger is towards the endcap....this bat seems to have a sweetspot that continues on where the Velocit-e's is if that makes sense. It almost seems as if the sweetspot spans literally from the taper to the about 1" to the endcap. Bottom line, the sweet spot is gigantic on this bat. The performance of this bat is awesome as I mentioned earlier, easily competing with the bats I feel set the industry standard (Freak + and OGJH). The longest shots of the day for me went to the Reaper, this seemed true for most of the power hitters, however the slap hitters continued to hit the Freak+ better than with Reaper, OGJH or Helmer. Another nice thing about this bat is the pop, solid shots through the infield, and nice line drives into the outfield. I wont go as far as to say this bat will make a your everyday 'Larry' into a stud, but hit it on the sweetspot and you will not want to put it down. The .75oz endload is the perfect amount for me, and will be for those who want a bit more endload than a Jeff Hall in my opinion. I was able to hit more over the LF/LC fences between 320'-365' than I ever have with any legal Utrip stick. Plain and simple, I was impressed with its performance. As far as the rest of the bat, the knob is a standard combat bat knob. The endcap says tamper proof.....though I am sure there are some guys who will find a way to get it off (hopefully not). Overall, we put about 350 more hits on this bat, totaling roughly 450 hits. The bat broke in at the 150 hit mark (very good imo) about the same as the new M75 Mayhem. With an endload of a Freak +, and relatively very short break in period, you definitely see the homework Rip-It put in to create the Reaper. They took the best of both worlds and combined it into one bat. Though manufactured by Combat, this bat is different from my SX3, B-1 and Virus bats. Would I put my Freak+ down for this bat.....yep I already have.....in fact, I stopped swinging the Recoil and Players Model due to how much fun this bat is to hit. As always, it wont be for everyone, but it WILL be for those who like a stiffer bat, with great performance. Matt, you did really well with this stick! A+ from me and the boys on the West Coast. Pros - quick break-in, generous sweetspot, solid performance, great distance, nice endload Cons - stiffer handle, seemed more suited towards power hitters, has a relatively large endload __________________ |
| June 5, 2007 DesertGuy Men's 60 224 posts | azsenior- I'm still confused on one thing about your advertising posts. Do you get paid by the number or posts or by the number of words you use in each of them? |
| June 5, 2007 AZTOMC Men's 55 139 posts | I did not read this as an advertising post. I read it as a good review of a new bat that is coming out. |
| June 5, 2007 azsenior 92 posts | Desert Guy: I am very disappointed at your attitude of anything outside your common knowledge. Would you feel the same way if this post was talking about Miken, Worth, Easton or Combat. I understand the concept of customer loyalty and I know that many are bothered by the rise of a new company taking market share. Why is it so hard for you to understand a group of players, all in the same area that truly like this company and want to help. Rip It has helped our softball community with free clinics, demo bats and bought outfield signs to support our fields. Are we not free on this board to express our views, likes and support of any company we chose or must we only give praise to the good old boy accepted few. If you think we are advertising for Rip It then so be it. I will do all I can to promote them and so will our little clad, so get use to it. Like it or not the Rip It brand is here and going to be huge. They make great products, very creative in marketing and most important have a passion for softball. |
| June 5, 2007 einstein Men's 50 3112 posts | That's a terrific post. Informative, passionate and detailed. The Rip-it Bats I have are as good or better than any bat I've ever swung and they continue to get hotter all the time. But forgive me for not knowing who you are by your handle but with all respect for whoever you are I for one, would tend to believe you a lot more, if I knew who you were and you were willing to stand up for what you have to say. |
| June 6, 2007 koived 41 posts | It's funny how this is a third party reveiw and almost all of your other posts are about rip-it. |
| June 6, 2007 goseniors! 3 posts | koived, By saying "3rd party review" in the title, I think azsenior was trying to convey that it was not his review. He has been very upfront about his support of Rip-It for some time, and like AZTOMC and einstein I though it was an excellent review and not an advertisement. I saw this review prior to it being posted here on the softballfans.com message board. It was posted by MikeL, so I assume that it was in fact MikeL who wrote this review. Either way, whether it was MikeL or azsenior, thanks for the thorough review of the reaper. I am looking forward to trying one of these. Does anybody know if they are available yet? |
| June 6, 2007 azsenior 92 posts | I did not write the review. Found it on softball fans. I am not quaified to write about bats, heck I can hardly hit. |
